A Letter from the Wilderness: Open Wounds

There’s a wound I keep in a drawer.
Not because I’m pretending it’s healed, but because life insists on being lived. There are papers to grade, meals to make, cheeks to kiss, and obligations to keep. So, I close the drawer most days and move through the rhythm of ordinary hours. But every time life shifts — a new season, a change in rhythm, a transition I didn’t choose — I hear it slide open again.

The air changes. The wound breathes.

It doesn’t bleed anymore, but it hasn’t sealed shut either. It’s a quiet ache that hums beneath everything, a reminder of what was lost or never made right. For a long time, I thought the goal was to close it — to pray harder, think stronger, push through. But some wounds don’t close on command. They become part of you, and learning to live with them becomes its own kind of training.

That’s where support matters.
Not because a coach or companion can fix the pain, but because walking with someone who helps you see how you carry it changes everything.
A good guide doesn’t rush you toward healing — they help you learn the rhythm of moving with it. They remind you that strength isn’t pretending you’re fine; it’s allowing yourself to be guided while you find your balance again.

Functioning with open wounds is not about closure — it’s about resilience.
The kind that isn’t loud or defiant, but steady and lived-in. The kind that lets you keep showing up even when something inside you still aches. It’s learning how to breathe through the tenderness instead of shutting it away.

If you find yourself in a season where the drawer has opened again, this is your invitation: don’t do it alone.
Find the person, the practice, the support that helps you remember you can move — you don’t have to stay stuck.

Because healing isn’t always about erasing the pain.
Sometimes it’s about learning how to walk with it and still find your way forward.